Without Within
by Waterkai
Summary: Small One-Shot expanding on Ulquiorra's back story as seen in UNMASKED. Hope you'll enjoy it P:


Without Within

**What is there, over there?**

**There is nothing**

But then again, what is nothing?

**I was born at the bottom of a pit where no light shone**

As if it was… afraid of me. Afraid to fill up that nothing within me

**As if pressed together by the darkness**  
><strong>Uncertain of what to become<strong>  
><strong>Born under those dark, dark sediments<strong>  
>Born under those abhorrent impressions<p>

**I had a white form**  
><strong>My comrades were all in pure black<strong>

Would that mean, that I was, that I am… different? Or was my body a renounced canvas, empty and so untouchable not even the darkness would risk itself in my proximity?

**In those black forms, with their eyes shining and teeth baring, they were certainly eating something.**  
><strong>And then...<strong>

**There was nothing to me, except my eyes.**

The void was still there, and it remained that way, maybe grew even stronger as I ripped off and devoured limb after limb, heart after heart.

And yet the emptiness remained, more absolute than the reality of this inane world.

**I felt nothing**  
><strong>No, rather<strong>  
><strong>It was possible that what I felt was truly a "void", yet<strong>  
><strong>I could hear nothing,<strong>  
><strong>I could bite nothing<strong>  
><strong>I could smell nothing<strong>  
><strong>I could feel nothing as I touch<strong>  
><strong>I could not rest<strong>  
><strong>I had no companion<strong>  
>Nothing but nothing<p>

**Just walking, alone**

**The things reflected in my eyes have no meaning**  
><strong>The things that could not be reflected in my eyes, do not exist.<strong>

**Walking**  
>Endlessly walking<p>

Where the pit ended, the desert began. Where the light first hadn't dared to caress me, now suffocated me within its insurmountable grasp.

And yet still, it reflected in my eyes and held no meaning.

**When I had arrived at that thought**  
><strong>I have found something extraordinary<strong>

**It was, somewhat, the place of birth for those strange, translucent objects that dotted this world.**  
><strong>It was the first time my eyes have been captured.<strong>

And when my eyes where the only thing to me.  
>I followed them.<p>

**With no colour,**  
><strong>With no sound,<strong>  
><strong>With no scent,<strong>  
><strong>Does not interact with anything,<strong>  
><strong>It only exists there.<strong>

**It was the closest existence to "void" that I had ever laid eyes on.**

It was, maybe, the closest thing that I had ever found "true".

**I sank my body into that great "void"**

My whiteness not illuminating it slightly.

**There was nothing there,**  
><strong>Even I had lost my line of vision, and dissolved into the void,<strong>  
>And when my eyes vanished<br>**it felt as if everything had disappeared.**

Happiness.

But it didn't work.

The "void" chipped off my mask, and suddenly I no longer could only see.  
>I could hear something,<br>I could bite something  
>I could smell something<br>I could feel something as I touch  
>I could rest<br>But still nothing reflected in my eyes  
>And I was alone<p>

The void grew larger  
>Smaller<br>More infinite  
>Less nowhere<p>

And there was the man.  
>He offered me…<br>To fill the void

But even though my body was born anew, and my existence was now another, I was still empty.

I returned to the "void", tamed it, made it my weapon.  
>Through its translucence the light shined on me, streamed around me like a rock in a riverbed.<br>But my soul was still impenetrably empty.

The endless sorrow pouring down my face  
>Is in no way representative of how I… feel<br>Because feeling cannot be reflected into my eyes  
>It cannot exist<p>

When the man asked me to crush my eyes  
>I did<br>When the man asked me to kill a boy  
>I did<br>When the man asked me to join his group  
>I did<p>

But camaraderie was wasted upon me. Their heads were full of feelings, troubles, thoughts. Their souls, stirring, whirling, restless. Not like a hollow.

I was the true hollow.  
>Within and without.<p>

I hid my powers.  
>Who would understand the nothingness of the "void" I wielded?<br>Who would comprehend my despair, my true Hollow-like despair?

But the man is smart  
>And wisdom leads to answers<br>Answers lead to questions  
>Questions are nihil<p>

Maybe, once, sometimes, forever, surely, not.  
>Within I am restless<br>Without I am

**If such a thing called happiness exists in this world, it should be something which resembles the limitless nothingness.**  
>Something that resembles "true despair".<p>

**Nihilism is having nothing, and having nothing to lose.**  
><strong>If that isn't "happiness", then what is?<strong>

Others cannot understand.  
>They will not understand<br>What they behold as nothing is everything in my eyes

We feed off the ignorant  
>We fight against the stubborn<br>We die because of the wise

**The things reflected in my eyes have no meaning**  
><strong>The things that could not be reflected in my eyes, do not exist.<strong>

**There is nothing**

No thing

**In you**

**And in me**

But less within  
>Than more without<p>

* * *

><p>The words in <strong>bold<strong> are literally adopted from Ulquiorra's back story, which served as the base for this article. All credits go to Tite Kubo for those lines.


End file.
